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Researchers from the National University of Singapore (NUS) said the incidence of breast cancer among Singapore women in their 50s is fast increasing, driven strongly by a low fertility rate.

The good news is, survival rates are also on the rise.

Professor Chia Kee Seng, director of Centre for Molecular Epidemiology, NUS, said: "Chinese have the highest breast cancer rates, followed by Malays and Indians. But the pattern of breast cancer according to age is quite different.

"For the Chinese and Malay, post-menopausal rates essentially plateau off... whereas for the Indian population, the agespecific rates continue to increase over the entire age group."

Many factors are associated with breast cancer, including changes in lifestyle and a rapidly declining fertility rate.

"They have their first child later in life, which means they have an increased risk of breast cancer because there are few factors that protect women from breast cancer the same way as having many children and the first child very early in life."

"The important message that we want to get across is that women who are 50 and above, especially those who have started their family late and have a small number of children should go for mammographic screening," said Prof Chia.

Prevention is just as important as early detection, as shown by a recent study on Chinese women in Singapore, which showed that eating more soy-based food products may reduce the risk of breast cancer.

Associate Professor Koh Won Puay, Occupational & Family Medicine, NUS, said: "More of the women without cancer were eating soy products, compared to those with breast cancer. We’ve also found that women who had most protection were women who had been eating soy foods since adolescent days."

Editor notes:

Breast cancer kills 46,000 women in the U.S. each year and on average each of these women has her life cut short by 20 years.

According to the physician Janette D. Sherman, breast cancer is caused by excessive exposure to carcinogens. She asked, "If cancers are not caused by chemicals, endocrine-disrupting chemicals, and ionizing radiation, what are the causes?

Dr. Sherman lists the known "risk factors" the common characteristics shared by many women who get breast cancer:

• Obesity

• High fat diet

• Being tall

• Excessive use of alcohol

• Use of oral contraceptives,

• Early menarche (age at which menstruation begins)

• Late menopause (age at which menstruation ends)

• Late childbirth and the birth of few or no children

• Having cancer of the ovaries or uterus

• No experience in breast-feeding

Her conclusion is: these risk factors are all linked to hormones of the wrong kind. These are related to the environmental factors like food (contaminated by various artificial chemicals and growth hormones), water, air and ionizing radiation from x-rays etc.

In 1971, human cancer from DES exposure was confirmed and in 1973 DES was banned from meat, so other growth hormones were substituted. Unfortunately, recently FDA has allowed the U.S. milk supply to be modified to increase the levels of a growth hormone (called IGF-1) known to stimulate growth of breast cells in women.

Today, most U.S. beef, chickens and pigs are intentionally contaminated with growth hormones. This is the reason why many Europeans refuse to allow the import of U.S. beef.

European scientists are asking the same question that Dr. Sherman raises: "Hormones are administered to meat animals to promote growth and weight gain. Why should humans expect to not respond similarly to such chemical stimuli?"

Then hundreds of household chemicals and industrial byproducts that are hormonally active: pesticides, cleansers, solvents, plasticizers, surfactants, dyes, cosmetics, PCBs, dioxins, and so forth. They interfere with, or mimic, naturally-occurring hormones. We are awash in these, at low levels, from conception until death.

Is Mammogram an answer to prevention of breast cancer?

"The high sensitivity of the breast, especially in young women, to radiation induced cancer was known by 1970. Nevertheless, the establishment (US) then screened some 300,000 women with X-ray dosages so high as to increase breast cancer risk by up to 20 percent in women aged 40 to 50 who were mammogrammed annually… Mammography will extend at best 2 women's lives for 10,000 women put at risk…

100,000 man-made chemicals are polluting our environment. 500 man-made chemicals are thought to disrupt the hormones in our body and mimic the role of oestrogen -- a hormone closely linked with the development of breast cancer.

In our bodies

At least 300 man-made chemicals have been found in human blood and body tissue. Cancer-causing substances and hormone-disrupting chemicals are included in this ‘toxic burden’.

Over 43,000 women and 300 men, are diagnosed with breast cancer every year.

More than 12,300 women die every year from breast cancer.

In women aged 35-54 years, breast cancer is the most common cause of all deaths, accounting for 17% of all deaths.

Breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer in women under 35.

The lifetime risk of being diagnosed with breast cancer in women is 1 in 9.

Replenish body with healthy fats like fish oil, cold-pressed flaxseed oil and other vegetable oils. Fried fats and unhealthy fats tend to block the flow of not just blood but also interstitial fluid, lymph fluid inclusive.

Avoid unnecessary X-rays

Don't wear very tight-fitting brassiere as to improve the circulation around the breasts. Breast glands are connected with the lymphatic system. So, it makes sense not to block the flow of the fluid.

Don't wear wired bra, because the wire function like a antenna, it will intensify the exposure to electromagnetic and radio frequently bombardment.

Cut down food high on refined carbohydrates

Weight and emotional control. Research and experience show that overweight and emotional problems have significant link to cancer

Exercise and practise deep relaxation. Yoga is ideal.

Perspiration: if you can't sweat properly, you stand at a higher chance of heavy metal contamination. So, exercise till body perspire, if not, use sea-salt foot bath or FIR sauna to promote sweating...